By the end of 2023, digital advertising spending in the United States exceeded $220 billion, continuing the U.S.’s reign as the leader in the global ad market. This growth year after year demonstrates that digital platforms are not just a trend but a reflection of changing consumer behaviors. People are spending more time online, whether on social media, search engines or various websites, making these platforms prime real estate for reaching your target audience. By leveraging digital advertising, businesses can tap into these vast online spaces, ensuring their messages reach the right people at the right time.
However, this doesn’t mean businesses should allocate all their marketing funds to the digital sphere. As Amber Selman, paid media guru and owner of Grate View Communications, explains, businesses trying to reach farmers and ranchers should diversify their paid media options to truly connect with their target audience. Grab your notebook and pen, and let’s dive into what Amber has to say.
Ashley: Starting off, could you share a brief overview of your communications/marketing experience and what motivates your passion for the field?
Amber: The easiest way to explain what I do is, I help agriculture companies advertise. It used to be radio ads, print ads and maybe a billboard. It used to be very valuable, very easy to understand and physically see. I'd pick a billboard, or I’d pick a certain paper or publication.
I still do all of that. Businesses still advertise that way, but it's a much smaller percentage of their budget and their media spend overall. So their advertising dollars go much more to digital tactics. And that's where more of my expertise is used now.
I am keeping up with all of the trends, figuring out all the options there are digitally. You know, there are programmatic ads, I call them the creepy ads that follow you around that you tell your friends like, “How do they know that?” There are a lot of moving pieces that come with programmatic ads that I stay on top of for my clients. Then Google has paid search and a lot of different marketing opportunities, followed by YouTube, social media, etc. Even many publications have a lot of digital offerings as well, such as custom text messages, and things like that.
My role with Grate View Communications is to keep up with this ever-changing industry so I can help businesses figure out what's going to be best within their budget for their audience. As far as what drives my passion, honestly, the neat thing for me is that we farm with my parents, and I literally will picture my dad, my husband and my cousin, where are they getting their information? What time of year is it? You know, one of the best examples of putting this into practice for my clients is I don't like to do CTV (Connected TV) ads during the summer. Farmers are never inside in the summer, that's a terrible time to spend your money on that tactic. The only time my husband and I watch TV is in the winter, when it's cold, and you're inside more. Again, a lot of farmers are very much like that as well, you know, they're enjoying the sun or working until nine o'clock, you know, things like that. With what I do, it's about putting that layer of agriculture knowledge on top of all of the options as well.
Ashley: Can you break down why a client should consider adding digital marketing and advertising strategies into their 2025 marketing plan?
Amber: I don't think I need to answer that question. And I might flip the question on its head for you. Purely because I think everyone wants to go digital. Everyone understands it's much more cost-effective to reach a wider audience. They just might not know all the options available to them and how impactful diversifying your tactics can be. As marketing budgets become slimmer and slimmer, businesses may want to naturally reach for those more cost-effective tactics, but I try to push print and radio as well.
NAMA and The Ag Media Council just released its 2024 media usage study. They studied over 250 farmers across the U.S. – from blueberry growers to cattle producers and all other farmers in between. These organizations put out this survey every two years, and print still reigns king among farmers. I believe it's about 68% of farmers view some sort of ag magazine or newspaper every week. I know businesses feel as though print is expensive, especially because you can't track a lot of ROI. But again, coming with a farming background, I know which publications will sit on their table, and actually, get read by farmers. This target audience uses their hands in nearly every aspect of their job, they’re hands-on folks and they want to have hands-on materials to read.
Now, is print where you should put all your budget? Absolutely not. But I do see a lot of people cutting out print to go more digital. And so that's something I'd probably recommend a bit more in 2025. Leave a little space for print. And if they choose to incorporate print, I encourage them to incorporate QR codes or vanity links as a way to measure the ROI.
Ashley: I'm glad you brought that up. As you were talking my mind first went to my college days, when I frequently heard or read articles that suggest the death of print was near. However, when working one of my first internships I went out to the state fair to ask folks across Missouri where they were getting their news. And it was newspaper, newspaper, newspaper time and time again.
Now, when somebody seeks out your services, how do you help them balance both that print side and that digital side?
Amber: I have about a two-page document of questions. These are questions I have learned over the years of planning a lot of media. With questions such as “Do you have certain states you can't sell your product/service in?”, we can use digital advertising to target messages down to the right county and zip code level. Asking “What is your kind of retention area? What is your growth area?” ensures we put more money behind that specific goal. Specific goals could include awareness of a new product, increasing sales, etc. Questions like these will all shape what media tactics we choose. Then with the budget they have, I sit and play a game of Budget Tetris – mixing and matching tactics to get the most with the money we have. And in that Budget Tetris, you try to get a mix of media.
Ashley: I remember working with digital advertisers at one of my previous jobs, and the clients would need to know they’d want certain digital ads months in advance. Can you walk me through typical timelines of digital advertising and what a client might need to make note of upfront?
Amber: Now, it depends on what you're doing. I would recommend starting with a yearly lights-on-advertising plan. And any sort of launch plan, you definitely want to start talking with the media contacts three, maybe four months in advance. If you’re a business looking to do a campaign with a quick turnaround, you're probably going to run it on social, which has essentially unlimited impressions. It usually takes two months to work through the strategy, to figure out the plan itself, and then review it, to make sure we're all good.
At the same time, you’ll need to be crafting creative assets. So for print, usually you want to plan about six weeks out before you know it's the publication is sent to the printers. To put it in perspective, if you're looking at a print date of September 1, the artwork is due July 15. It takes quite a bit of time to get creative and some businesses will have their legal team review, – especially when dealing with more sensitive topics like a vaccine or medication. So it all definitely takes time. It's not a fast process at all.
In addition, when it comes to working with publications, we can run into availability issues that will also require planning quite a bit in advance to ensure you snag that limited space. I was actually just talking with Hoard’s Dairyman, they have an amazing guest blog where you get to write a 500-word educational article that they put on their website. Then they promote it for you on their website and Facebook pages. It sold out by June 1, and that’s typical for them to sell out fast. Hoard’s Dairyman releases one blog a week so that means there are only 52 slots for purchase. I was also talking with the publication about another placement option that hasn’t been available for purchase for the last seven years. Hot placement items take a lot of time, expertise and speed to secure. Having ongoing conversations and relationships with the publications helps a lot with what I do because they know I’m reliable and my clients are reliable. These relationships can lead to moments where they say “Hey we just had someone canceled. We would need artwork in like two days, but would your client like to secure a spot?” You never know when those opportunities will pop up.
Lastly, I would say advertising runs very much on a calendar year. So if you're kind of on an odd fiscal year, that's something to keep in mind as you’re planning.
Ashley: This all leads well into my next question. You mentioned you need to keep up a professional working relationship with all the potential advertisers, what does that look like on the backend? How do you ensure you stay connected?
Amber: Around October or November, I start to reach out to my list of publications I've worked with and ask them for a new media kit. Ask them if anything's new. It's usually just a quick email, you know, saying I'm still interested in connecting you with the right clients and understanding all of the available advertising options they are offering in this upcoming year. These conversations can last anywhere from 30 minutes to two hours with larger named publications. I’ll typically meet with different publications when attending NAMA or other ag shows, or even trade shows, like the Farm Progress Show. So really I’m staying in constant contact. Having those relationships is just so helpful. Especially in the ag industry, where we are all very much value the relationships we build – whether you’re on my side of the business or you’re an ad rep.
Ashley: Is there anything else you’d like to make sure folks know about the importance of digital advertising?
Amber: One thing I see a lot of, that I would caution or recommend, is we live in a world of instant results. Everything is instant, instant, instant. I can pull the metrics as soon as a client requests it. However, if an ad has only been running for a week they won’t see the full picture by the end of week one. Instead, they may see it’s performing well below the benchmark because the ad hasn’t run the full course of its three, six or 12 months.
I find that a lot of clients want to know, like, weekly or daily what is happening, when really, you need to be looking at the results overall. We need to look at the results over a two to three-month span. By doing that you can better analyze if one day or one week was a blip or if we’re trending well over a couple of months. Because think about how many ads you see in a day, like, it may take you seven to 12 times before you don’t gloss over that one specific ad. It may take seven to 12 times to be exposed to that ad before you actually recognize it. And that’s why a week is a little too short. Now after two months of an ad running, if something isn’t working we shift it. You can always make shifts when needed. Then if you're able to look at your year-over-year advertising overall, it can guide you on what is working this year what may have worked better last year, and what can work for us next year.
Ashley: I’ve had the pleasure of connecting with Amber through a mutual client as well as the Get Freelancing Community. She’s an upbeat, go-getter with extensive knowledge of and passion for paid media. To gather more paid media insight, be sure to follow Amber on LinkedIn. Then check out her business Grate View Communications to make sure you’ve got the right paid media plan lined out for the upcoming year.
…And don’t forget, as Amber reminds us, print is not dead!
*The Industry Insights series was created to provide additional expertise for those seeking marketing services to understand what they need or who they can reach out to get started. Featured experts are well-versed in the communications field.
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